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Thursday, December 27, 2012

A Proposed Way to Reduce Gun Violence

I support the right of sane & law-abiding citizens to own and useguns. But many guns that were originally purchased by regular peopleare now in the hands of criminals or mentally ill persons. I thinkthat the law should make gun owners more responsible for preventingsuch transfers. So what I'm proposing is that whenever a gun is foundin the possession of someone other than the original owner, there is apresumption of a crime by the owner. The crime would most likely beculpable negligence. That would be the case if there was no criminalintent, but the owner sold the gun, or left it behind when moving, orfailed to take reasonable measures to keep it from being stolen. Inorder to transfer a gun from one private party to another, there wouldhave to be a registration process. To skip this registration processwould be culpable negligence. If a gun is stolen, the police must benotified so that there is a record of that event. When an heiracquires a gun due to a death, a similar procedure must occur.What this would do is give gun owners additional motivation to preventtheir guns from falling into the wrong hands. Would it have preventedAdam Lanza from getting his hands on one of his mother's guns in herbasement, loading it, and killing her? We cannot know that, but atleast Nancy Lanza, as part of her weapons training, would have beentold about the law. That might have made her more aware of the riskshe was taking.But this approach certainly cannot prevent all gun violence. What itwould do is cause many gun owners to think a little more about thewhereabouts of their guns. That ought to have a positive effect on ournational gun violence problem.

2 comments:

When I was a teenager in Florida, I (and every other male I knew) had a veritable arsenal hanging on my bedroom wall. And yet somehow none of those guns were ever used unsafely. I attribute this in part to a "kinder, gentler world", but in equal part to the fact that we were all trained thoroughly in gun safety. We knew how to maintain, store, handle and use our guns, because we didn't get to graduate from a BB gun to a .22 until we had demonstrated said skills and responsibilities to our families' satisfaction.

Meanwhile, how many times as many people are killed by or in automobiles due to careless, irresponsible or incompetent use of same? We make an effort to stem this tide of blood by forcing everyone to pass tests before they are allowed to drive. This helps a bit.

So I would suggest that people should have to pass similar tests in order to obtain a license to handle or own a gun. BB guns are unlicensed as long as they lack sufficient muzzle velocity to break human skin; for a pellet gun you only need a learner's permit; for a .22 you need to show additional competence and responsibility; more for a shotgun, and still more for a hunting rifle. An assault rifle might well be license-able, but the examinations and prior record of safe use would be daunting, a bit like obtaining a Chauffeur's License to drive a schoolbus. Maybe moreso. Combine this with your idea and maybe it would have some effect; but to really clear things up you'd have to get rid of all the shoot-em-up video games and then wait a generation....

Of course, for either of these to get a toehold you'd have to require universal registration so that only criminals would have unregistered guns. The NRA would say this violates their enshrined rights. Yeah, well... how about my right to wear shoes at the airport? No one seems to think that's worth protecting. Americans don't seem to care much about their rights since 9/11.

Food for thought: what if Henry Ford had pushed through a Constitutional Amendment enshrining everyone's right to own and drive a car?

I think guns and automobiles should be treated the same. Both are potentially dangerous machines which are very useful and loved bymany. You should need to be tested to get a license for either, and both should be registered.